Best chess Blitz player

In my opinion Viswanath Anand is best blitz player

He bases it on him being Indian, the Indian players here have an unhealthy (to the point of being cringeworthy) obsession with Anand. It's like some sort of chess cult.

I have never played him, so I can't in good conscience agree or disagree.

Good point. Rumour has it that he's a pretty strong player, though.

The answer has to be Alexander Grischuk, the current world blitz champion and the only person ever to win the championship twice.

He won it with a margin of 0.5 point, and the previous time he won it was six years ago when it was decided in tiebreak, so I don't think he has to be the best blitz player, there's probably not much separating the best but I'd say Carlsen scores the best blitz results on average over the last years.

You say it is not convincing to win by 0.5 a point, so you favour someone who lost by 0.5 points. Carlsen has the potential to be the best blitz player of recent years but he needs to prove it - at present he is up there with the others who have won the world blitz championship once and fallen short on other occasions. This could be a result of him not having yet reached his peak at blitz, which takes a little longer to develop (as finding moves quicker is more dependent on experience).

"He's only the best blitz player by a little, so I don't think he's the best blitz player at all...."

No, I favour someone who scores better results on average. Carlsen finished 7.5 points ahead of Grischuk in the World Blitz Championship 2009 (he had 4.5 points margin down to Grischuk the next year, while the event wasn't played in 2011):

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?tid=70133

Apart from his gold?

Carlsen and Grischuk faced each other in seven blitz games 2009-12, and Carlsen scored +5 -1 =1. Both in the World Blitz Championships 2009 and 2010 he finished far ahead of Grischuk (in all scoring 12 points more). Carlsen also shared first in the Tal Memorial Blitz this year (one point ahead of Grischuk).

Even though the World Blitz Championship later was cancelled in 2011 the qualification was held, and Grischuk finished in 8th place (failing to qualify for the final), most of the players ahead of him being in the 2600s.

So while Grischuk obviously is a great blitz player I don't agree that he must be ranked ahead of Carlsen. Over the last years Carlsen has scored significantly better results every time they faced each other, both head to head and tournament wise, the only exception being the latest World Blitz Championship, where Grischuk finished 0.5 point ahead.

Not always under his control but yeah.

I enjoyed watching Naka playing blitz of a very high level.To give you an idea:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJVwJ5m6zkA

In 2012, Carsen got 1:1 versus Grischuk and a lower score than him against everyone else. As a statistical sample of their performance, this most recent performance clearly favours Grischuk by the smallest margin. Over a longer period, winning the tournament twice is more important than performing poorly at other times (like one Wimbledon championship and an exit in the first round is better than losing in the the final twice).

Naka

The five strongest blitz events of the last years:

World Blitz Championship 2010:

Tal Memorial Blitz 2012

Final standings

World Blitz Championship 2012:

In 2008 there was also a World Blitz Championship (weaker than the Tal Memorial Blitz the same year). It was won by Dominguez ahead of Ivanchuk, Svidler and Grischuk:

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5005

Ivanchuk has scored many good blitz results, in 2007 he won the World Blitz Championship ahead of Anand:

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=4275

Grischuk's first World Blitz Championship win in 2006:

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=3334

The top blitz players are Grischuk(2923), Andreikin (2877), Karjakin(2877), Carlsen (2856).

i think the best blitz player until now should be vassily ivanchuck